When Turner and the others started what became the successful Vapewild brand, they had just 30 employees. The concept was a relatively new idea in the vaping business and the brand took off like a rocket. By the end of 2016, they had grown their operation to more than 320 employees, a number of them combat veterans, spread across two facilities located around Dallas, Texas, plus a four-person operation in Ireland acting as a fulfillment center for European customers. The product was all manufactured in the United States. Everything was going great. Then the roof fell in.

New UL 8139 provides framework to evaluate, test and certify the electrical and battery systems of electronic cigarettes

UL, a leading global safety science organization, is announcing acceptance of product submittals of electronic cigarettes, also known as e-cigarettes, for construction evaluation, testing and North American certification.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security reported an increased number of incidents involving fire resulting in injury requiring medical treatment. These recent events highlight the dramatic market growth of e-cigarette use and the associated safety concerns. UL will now be able to test and certify these devices using UL 8139 through a system approach to evaluate the device, its rechargeable battery and charging system.

Given the widespread but often unsuccessful efforts to quit smoking, one might think that U.S. health officials would welcome a new and far less dangerous substitute behavior: vaping. Unfortunately, regulators so far mistakenly have treated vaping akin to smoking, rather than embracing vaping’s smoking-cessation potential.

Brad Coleman, owner of Vapes in Dickinson, has been in the vaping business for about eight years now, two of those in his own store. He said although stress reasons have brought him back to cigarettes, vaping has actually helped.

“As a smoker since I was a kid, it’s the only way I’ve ever been able to quit smoking,” he said.

But not all may be lost for vapers. A bipartisan bill introduced Feb. 16 by Reps. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) and Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.) would give a much-needed reprieve to the e-cigarette industry preventing the de facto prohibition of most vapor products.

The Deeming Authority Clarification Act of 2017 would amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act to change the predicate date from Feb. 15, 2007, to when the deeming regulations came into effect, on Aug. 8, 2016.